A Conversation with Forged In Fire Judge David Baker

Today’s David Baker interview is presented by our friends at Wicked Wax. Follow Wicked Wax on Instagram @wickd_wax or visit their site to purchase today!

BRUTE de FORGE was honored to have the opportunity to sit down recently with the one and only David Baker. David is not only a Forged In Fire judge but also a world-renowned weapons maker and historian. Keep reading to find out more about him and his time on the show. After some small talk, we dove right in.

RELATED: FIVE THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT FORGED IN FIRE’S DAVID BAKER

David’s Hollywood Origins

BRUTE de FORGE: Thank you so much for sitting down with me today, David! I’m sure you get this question a lot. Can you tell us about how you got into forging and blade smithing?

David Baker: That’s funny you ask; I got a bunch of these types of questions over the weekend.  When I was a kid, everything I picked up was a sword. The movies that I loved were the swashbuckling pirate movies of the 40s and 50s. I was a kid in the 60s; I was born in 1962. But I remember in California, we had this thing called the “Billion-Dollar Movie.” It was a local channel, and it was like noon when it came on. Some were absolutely terrible! But we would get the TV Guide at the beginning of the month, and the guide would tell you what would be on TV all month long. So, I would figure out when those movies—Robin Hood, Captain Blood, or all these movies that I loved—were going to be on, and I would get sick that day and have to stay home from school.

Growing up watching those movies and then getting into the entertainment industry as an actor, I really wanted to be in those movies. I wanted to be in a swashbuckling film. So, I started studying fencing and then theatrical combat.  Then, I eventually started teaching theatrical combat, and this was in the early 90s. But there just wasn’t the equipment that we have now. There weren’t a lot of companies offering swords. You could buy the Toledo Steel stuff, but none of it was tempered. You could bend that stuff in half. Or, there was the museum replicas catalog, but it was just too expensive, and, honestly, a lot of it didn’t hold up the way you need it to for theatrical uses.

So, I started making stuff for my classes. I would go and haunt some of the antique gun stores or the prop houses, which often had selloffs, and I would buy old blades from them and then remount them. I knew how to weld, so I started welding stuff.

Then I did a production of a show, and the people on the following show said, “Hey, can you do the swords for us?” I sold them some swords.  Then one of the guys who taught at a theatrical school in Northern California said, “Hey, can I buy some of these? Can you make some more of these?” It started to snowball and became a secondary thing. But then, around 2000, a friend of mine was going to Spain to do a TV show called Queen of Swords, which was like a female Zorro thing, and he asked me to do the swords for that. So, I did all the hero swords and all the stunt swords for that. That’s the point when I actually went into business making theatrical weapons.

Then that turned into someone saying, “Hey, can you make me a real one? Can you make a hero copy that’s steel?” And I went down that road.

I was constantly learning, constantly trying new things, and rarely saying no. That was how I got into it. That’s the long story.

BDF: How long, then, have you been in the weapon-making business?

DB: Since 2000 I’ve been in the business, so for the past twenty-two years. Well, it was actually in 1999 when I started that project, technically twenty-three years ago. From there, I opened a prop company and supplied bladed weapons for various television and movie productions. It has been a good time! Then the last seven years have been spent on Forged In Fire and being the person who builds all the examples for the show. It has just taken up all my time.

BDF: I can imagine! I was going to ask you about that. I read that you forge the blades for the show. What’s that like?

DB: I don’t get the four whole days that the smiths get, that’s for sure! I get a weekend to build three blades. You learn to get fast.

The entertainment industry has some odd timelines in that things change so rapidly. You could be working all day on a project, and someone goes, “Oh, man, that’s beautiful, but we’re going to use that one three weeks from now, and we need this other one tomorrow.” And failure is not an option. You have to get it.

But I’ll tell you—true story—there have been a few swords on the show that, when they pulled the sheet away, the side viewers saw was finished, and the backside was not finished at all.

BDF: Really?

DB: Yes, one-sided swords. I mean, they eventually got finished because we use those swords. When Doug does his cut and kill tests, he gets to practice that in the morning with the sword I make. He can’t use the competitor’s blades. The first time we use those [the competitor’s] swords is when we pick them up and do it on camera. All my swords are the ones he practices with, so mine have to be ready and sharp. They all go through the tests, or most of the tests, which is fun.

BDF: Have any of yours ever broken?

David Baker: Yes. We’ve only broken a few of them! On stupid stuff like “Hey, let’s hit this torpedo or smash this metal bar.”

BDF: You know what it’s like to break a sword or two and be in the shoes of the contestants, then.

DB: Oh, yeah! I’ll speak for Ben, Jay, and myself as builders—Doug’s an end user, and he gets it, too—but as builders, we cringe when something breaks. I mean, yeah, we’re doing destructive testing, but it’s not because we want to break things. It’s because we’re trying to push these swords and knives to the limit. And I don’t think there’s been any episode that both weapons failed in the finale. So, are our methods extreme? Yes. Are they outside of the realm of what the swords can do? No. That’s the fun part.

BDF: The tests are intense. They make the audience cringe, too!

DB: It’s funny, sometimes the first or second hit, you feel or hear something, and you’re like, “Should I swing this one more time? Did I feel something crack? Did I feel something giveaway?” And half the time, when you swing it again, something goes loose, and you’re like, “Oh, dammit! I should have stopped and looked.”

Nobody likes seeing fourteen inches of blade flying through the air. You’re never quite sure which way it’s going go. It can be scary.

BDF: Have you had any significant injuries on set?

DB: I’ve stuck myself. I’ve stuck myself twice, actually. Once, when I was pulling the Kpinga out of the target. The back of it stuck me in the arm.

And then on a sword.  When I hit the target, it broke and swung back and cut me open right here (shows scar between thumb and forefinger). They wanted to stop shooting, and I said, “No, let’s go on!” I described what had happened, with blood dripping off my hand. But they didn’t use it. They cut it out and made redo it.

BDF: They should let the audience see those moments.

DB: You know, if you’re going to play with or build these weapons, you’re going to bleed. That’s all there is to it. I mean, it’s going to happen. You’re going to get stuck, whether it’s by your own weapon or someone else’s weapon. I managed to cut the tendon on my little finger just by unpacking a sword! It happens. You’re around razor-sharp blades, and things can go wrong rather quickly.

BDF: They refer to you a lot as the weapons historian on the show. Did you study weapons history in school, or have you just learned and gained so much field knowledge over the years?

DB: It’s because I’m old! (laughing). You know, it’s like, I’ve done stunts, but I’m not a stuntman. Am I into history? Yes. Do I study history? Yes. But I’m not a historian. It’s not the focus of what I do. But historical blades are what I have focused on and studied since I started making blades. When I’m working on something, or learning about something, or learning to use something, I like to study it in context.

For example, if you’re studying the rapier and how to use it the way it was used, study the architecture of the time to see where they were using this blade. Study the laws that allowed a person to use or not use this blade. Study the politics of the time and why these duels are happening. All of that information helps us understand why these weapons were developed and why they were used and carried. Even fashion. You get into the whole idea of some of these blades being used in high fashion, but they are almost useless.

So having a context around a given weapon, I think, makes for a better build. Of course, having the opportunity to travel like I’ve had in the past few years, going to museums in Europe, seeing collections, and having the opportunity to pick some weapons up and hold some actual period weapons changes your ballgame all the way across the board.

These weapons unlike most production weapons, these weapons were made for one thing, and that was killing another human being. They were not made to chop down trees in your backyard. They were not made to chop into metal pipes. They were not made to chop ice blocks or even ballistics gel torsos. They’re made to cut flesh and bone.

Again, context. That’s where history, for me, comes into it. Recreating or duplicating—or trying to duplicate—these historical weapons. You need the history to do that.

BDF: I’m sure knowing the history makes all the difference in many cases.

DB: Oh yeah! It’s like trying to read a book about a historical period that gives you no background context about it. You would be like, “Why are these people so rotten?” Well, sometimes, they’re not. They’re actually just living in the day. Is that a good thing? No. But it is what was going on in the period.

If you have that background, you can understand the whole story instead of trying to lay on modern morals.

Joining The Forged In Fire Team

BDF: How did you come to be involved with Forged In Fire? I believe you have been on the show since the beginning.

DB: Yeah, I have. I’ve actually been involved since before the beginning. Here is the story as it was told to me.

When they were looking for judges for the show, I’m pretty sure they had cast Doug already, and they had cast another smith who, I guess, backed out. So, they were looking for a master smith or somebody who was, like, the Jay character. They had the martial arts character, but they didn’t have somebody that had a historical background or someone who had experience on television before. Going into a show where nobody on your cast has previous television experience can be a bit of an issue, and I have done a number of shows before in front of the camera. Plus, I had done weapon shows, as well. I was on More Extreme Marksman, 101 Weapons That Changed the World, and Deadliest Warrior—I did two and a half seasons of that—so I have been on camera. And, of course, I had a reputation for making weapons and making them fast.

Basically, though, they were calling around to people in Hollywood, and they were talking to a lot of stunt guys, and a number of the stunt guys said, “Well, call Dave. He makes all my stuff. Just call Dave.”

Eventually, they called me. The poor girl that was doing the interview, though, I just kept showing her photos and books and talking about all sorts of historical weapons. This poor girl was overwhelmed, I think. Honestly, I don’t know that I was even asked to be on the show, so much as she just gave up, and they gave me the job!

Anyway, they called me up and asked if I would be willing to be a contestant. I said, “No way in hell.”  Then, the job came up for a judge.

I worked with the producers because we were originally trying to film in Los Angeles. A couple of the producers and myself were based out there. I looked for some studio space for them there, which did not work out. Then we got to the point where they were developing the set, and I was involved in what tools were needed to make it all work.

We went off and filmed the pilot in Seattle in a shop that was very small, and we had four guys running around trying to forge. But it was exciting. It was a lot of fun.

BDF: I can imagine being there from the beginning, and finally seeing it come to fruition was an incredible feeling.

DB: It was. They called us up and said that they had sold the pilot, and it was a done deal. Initially, we were supposed to just be a ten-episode fill-in, but I think by the time we finished our first ten, they had already bought twenty more episodes. Then they added another ten to that twenty, and it snowballed quickly.

 And that is great for a show that’s never been advertised! The network has never spent any money on it. We’ve never had a commercial, billboard, or anything. We are a word-of-mouth show, and we’re going into our 10th season! We’re all really proud of it.

And, it’s funny, I kind of came into it from outside the community. I wasn’t part of the knife community. I didn’t go to knife shows or spend a lot of money or time selling knives. I built props. I built weapons. I built swords. I came into this backward; I started with swords and went to knives. I started big. But being a part of starting a new renaissance, or revolution in knifemaking, that the show has been part of is really exciting.

The Impact of Forged In Fire on the Bladesmithing Industry

BDF: Have you noticed a rise in bladesmithing and this forging culture since the show began?

DB: Oh yeah. When we started, we were grabbing smiths where we could get them. Now, I would say sixty or more percent of the contestants that come on the show began forging because they watched Forged In Fire. If you started forging when the show began, you’ve got seven years of experience! That’s not a small thing. That’s career-building. A lot of the smiths who came on the show as hobbyists, once their episode aired, went pro. Most of that is due to television exposure and, I think, the camaraderie and knife-making community sharing skilled people.

BDF: As someone that is just on the perimeter of it—still just looking in from the outside—the forging community seems like a tight-knit community. Maybe the most surprising thing to me when we started was how many bladesmiths from all corners of the country know each other!

DB: Yeah, it’s interesting to me because we’re all competing with one another to sell things. But, at the same time, we’re all promoting each other by going to hammer-ins at other people’s shops, by going to their knife shows, and just by interacting with one another. There might be something somebody wants, and I don’t do, but I know somebody to send them to.

I don’t do that much now, though, mainly because of the show. You have to be careful of favoritism, now, and things like that.

BDF: Do you enjoy judging? Is it a difficult position to hold? I would have trouble delivering bad news, I think.  

DB: I enjoy it. I think I’m a fairly impartial judge on the show. I’m judging the best thing that’s sitting in front of me. And, honestly, when you see somebody work for five hours in front of you and turn in a knife, you owe them a legitimate critique of that piece of equipment. Good, bad, or indifferent.

I’ve never tried to be cruel. I think that one of the neat things about the show is that we’re not mean. To have a competition show, in this day and age, that shows respect to contestants and the industry we’re in and have no need to denigrate anybody for ratings is impressive.

BDF: I think what helps is that all of the judges can relate so well to the contestants. You have made the weapons. You’ve broken swords. You know what it’s like. You’re one of the few shows where the judges can sympathize with what it is like on the floor.

DB: When we started the show—and this is kind of how I came into the world of making the display weapons—I tried to contact people at the Met because we were going to be filming in New York, and I thought it would be so cool to pull the sheet away and have originals from the Met to show the contestants. Their weapons collection is huge and what’s on display is nowhere near all their weapons.

Somebody from production talked to somebody, and they were told that the problem was that a lot of these weapons are privately owned. They’re just kept at the Met, in the Met collection. They would have to be insured, the weapons would have to travel with their own docent, and they could not be touched by anybody. The rules just started stacking up, so that wasn’t going to happen.

And then it was like, we can source a lot of these blades from catalogs and things of that nature, but the first thing that went through my mind was that everybody who’s in this business is going to know exactly what catalog those weapons came from.

Eventually, there came to the point where I just felt like it would be disrespectful to judge somebody on something I hadn’t tried to do myself. So, I convinced the show to let me build all the weapons.

It’s been exhausting (laughing). At the start of a season, I usually try to get a bunch of weapons built before the episodes start filming. When we started, I didn’t have the shop I have now. My weekends and mornings are typically taken up by forging. I’m in the studio, forging because they don’t have a shop in Connecticut to work out of, so when we are not filming, I’m literally on the [studio] floor working. Suddenly, most of my days off were spent in the studio filming or forging. Which is fine, it’s what I do anyway.

That is something that I personally am very proud of. We’re not asking smiths to do things we haven’t done. If we have a challenge where they need to forge out of some strange material, like the titanium knife handle we did once, we try it too. Ben and I went in over a weekend and banged around with a bunch of titanium to see what we could do. The display model on that episode was Ben’s because his came out a lot better than mine did, but we did the challenge too! We’ve done some San Mai challenges, Go Mai challenges, and different types of pattern welding, and we’ve all done these things before we ask the smiths to do it. That way, we can critique what’s going on. I can usually see where contestants are going off the rails because I’ve screwed up the same way.

I love these guys and girls who come in and work so hard and do the best they can. And nobody makes their best stuff in three hours, under pressure, in front of the camera. Well, five hours total. Nobody does their best work, but we always have knives to pass through.

Memorable Moments from the Show

BDF: Are there any particularly memorable moments that stand out to you?

DB: Our “Young Guns Competition.” When we came to the end of that first round, we were looking at four completely viable knives with no issues. That was the first time we pushed all four people through. I mean, we were blown away! We were sitting there, and it turned into this big discussion with the producers because we hadn’t dealt with this scenario before. And these are guys who are all under twenty-one!

BDF: Doing that was great because it illustrated, as judges, how adaptable you were in the moment.

DB: Yeah, it was not a gimmick. Those guys deserved it. That was the first time we passed four knives, and all three of us judges on that episode were looking at them, going, “Well, I mean, we could say you’re out for this little, teeny blemish here, but then it’s nothing that affects the knife. It’s a cosmetic thing that can be fixed.” How do I explain that to someone? These guys just did solid work, and they all turned in blades that were 100% viable and made the five hours.

One was sharper than the other, as we found out. I think there was a loose handle situation that we found, but you don’t find those things out until you test. That’s what the tests are for. It wasn’t a cosmetic competition. It all came down to function. We often say ‘“function over fashion”!

But there are times it comes down to cosmetics. When craftsmanship is nearly equal and they both almost function the same, you kind of have to look at the better-executed blade

BDF: Have there ever been any disagreements between judges?

DB: Oh, we argue. It has gotten heated at times. Often, it’s not a unanimous decision, and it will be a two-to-one vote. But it’s a much longer process than the 10 seconds you see on TV. Sometimes the director and producer get involved. I mean, we all come from different places.

I’ve studied martial arts, and I’ve studied bladed combat for forty years. Am I a black belt? No. Can I hold my own with a cutlass? Yeah, although I’m nowhere near as fast as I used to be. But I understand combat, so I come at it from the historical aspect of knowing the weapon. Doug comes at it from his combative style, Ben might come at it from a whole different thing, and Jay, as a master smith, he’s all about fit-finish stuff. Then, throw craftsmanship on top of it, and it’s all these things coming into play.

So, occasionally there are arguments, but the thing is, regardless of all that, we’re still good friends.

BDF: Who decides what blade is going to be made in each episode?

DB: It’s a process. I make lists and push them up the chain of command to someone else. Then they make lists and push them down the chain of command, and we argue. Then somebody way high up in a tower in New York goes, we’ve done that one, and I say, “No, we haven’t. It looks like that one, but it’s a whole different culture.” They do the same thing, but they’re not the same.

Technically, the final decisions are made up the chain of command. But what goes into that are lists made by myself and the other judges, plus lists made by production, who are basically leafing through a bunch of books.

BDF: And then, how do you fit that into a storyline or a theme for the show?

DB: We try to continuously go around the world. We could have done the entire two hundred episodes just on European weapons. There would have been a lot of overlap in that. I mean, you would have twenty to twenty-five blade shapes that are just broad swords. Then you get into the curved sabers, the change of guard types that affect how they’re used. But all of that is too specific. Trying to explain that to an audience would be impossible.

But I’m always trying to get some history thrown into the show. Sometimes, though, it’s just “heat, beat, repeat,” and how fast can you do it.

BDF: What’s the most significant change you’ve noticed over the nine seasons?

DB: There’s a deeper understanding of what we’re doing. We can actually get a little bit more into the intricacies of what’s going on, as opposed to the big, broad brushstrokes that we used to have to do.

This past season, Season Nine, we’ve done a lot of format changes.  We’ve done a lot of these tournament situations. We’re trying to keep the show fresh. I think the show stands up fine, just doing the same thing we’ve always done, but we are also dealing with network people and people outside the blade culture who want some fresh excitement. But, as a competition show involving money, we have federal guidelines to follow, so we can’t just add drama. We can add drama in that we can change the format. For example, only giving them two and a half hours instead of three.

But I think the biggest change I’ve seen in the show is a more educated and dedicated audience. We’re now more willing to mess with the format without worrying that we might lose viewers. We won’t because we’ve got an incredibly dedicated audience.

The future of Forged In Fire

BDF: What do you see for the future of the show?

DB: For the past two years, we’ve been dealing with COVID. Now that COVID restrictions have lightened up quite a bit, I’m hoping to get out in the field more. We used to go to the gun range and other places for testing and creating. This past season was the first time we’ve gone out in two years. We went to Mystic Seaport, which was fabulous. I would love to do more of that.

I would love to see us do something with the Naval Academy because of the people that I’ve met out there. They’ve got a wonderful museum. Their collection of ship models is the biggest one in the world, and it’s absolutely mind-blowing. You could stand there and look at one of those ships all day long. The riggings are just perfect. All the models were the ones built while they were building the ship—crazy stuff. But, also, it’s the history of the Navy and has some hands-on things, not just displays. Contestants could see Admiral Perry’s sword in person, not a replica. So, I would love to see us go out in the world.

I’d love to see us do a live show. Something with an audience, maybe in an open arena. That would be fabulous! I think we could do it. I love interacting with an audience and talking to people while they’re watching what’s happening and getting their opinion on what’s happening—I think that would be so much fun!

We have crew members, our cameraman, for example, who have seen so many knives made but have never made a knife themselves. I think that’s the biggest request for an episode that I get; four people who’ve never done it before to go on and try it. Maybe they could each have a coach? But then there’s only three of us who were actually bladesmiths on the show, and we could do it with three people, but then, if I’m coaching this guy, how do I judge that guy? Generally, logistics would be an issue for that one.

My biggest desire for the show is that, as we enter our next season, I’m going to do everything I can to introduce us to a new audience. We have a very loyal following, but I meet people all the time who just don’t know the show is out there—getting a new audience to find the show so we can keep this moving forward. And keep inspiring people to build! Regardless of what it is, I don’t care what you create. You could be making food. You could be painting. You could be gardening, whatever; it doesn’t matter. If you go out and create something, you can change the world, you can change the people around you, and even your children—you change everything!

How to prepare for the show

BDF: Do you have any advice for people coming on the show or hoping to one day be on the show?

DB: We say it again and again and again. And so many people don’t do it. If you’re coming on the show, train for it! Be ready for the sheet. Learn how to meditate, learn how to stay calm, and learn how to stay in the environment you’re in.

Once and again, I know this from experience. When I did the first Super Champs Episode, we did, and I lost. I fell into a bunch of traps that the contestants always fall into. The first was that I turned around and looked at the clock! From the first time I looked at the clock, I kept turning around and looking at that clock. It gets in your head.

We’ve had a couple of episodes where we took the clock down and just yelled out the time. “You got 30 minutes to go!”.

BDF: I have talked with several bladesmiths who appeared on the show, and they have all said that it is the mental game that gets people.

DB: It is! And, you know, they’re bladesmiths. They do this all the time. But you have to be able to step in there and take a breath and remove yourself from the camera. You can’t worry about what they’re doing or what they’re doing. Nothing any of the other smiths do, other than waste time on a tool, is going to affect what you make. They might have grabbed the handle material you wanted, but there are still a ton of other handles to choose from. Other than slowing you down by using a tool, nothing they do is going to affect the outcome of your blade. So why look over?

There’s a recipe to follow when making a knife. If you follow the recipe, the knife always comes out the same way. So, when you see somebody stacking up material to stretch out a billet, they cut it into four pieces and start to re-stack it, but they don’t clean it first? Well, they just left out an important part of the recipe. Now the welds don’t fit right, and the ten minutes that it would have taken to clean it will now be thirty minutes of grinding the crud off, breaking it apart, restarting, and everything else. Just get in there, stay calm, and follow the recipe.

Advice for aspiring bladesmiths

BDF: Do you have any advice for people who are aspiring bladesmiths?

DB: The biggest is to stop asking people what they think. If this is what you aspire to make, then go on and make it. And if it doesn’t come out the way you want it, that’s fine. What did you learn in that process? Why is it not what you wanted to make?

I can’t tell you how many times I started with a big knife and ended up with a small knife. In my old shop, I had this corner that I threw everything into. There was plywood in the corner, so I’d just throw things in the corner when stuff broke or went wrong. Cut it up for a canister and make something else later.

Don’t let other people’s opinions discourage you from doing what you want to do. If you’re trying to make a living at it, if that’s your goal, then fine, you’re going to have to find the commercial niche you fit into. But that can be anything!

There’s a word that should never be uttered in the presence of a creator or an artist, and that is ‘should.’ The only person allowed to say ‘should’ to an artist, as far as I’m concerned, is the artists themselves. As far as the creative process goes, don’t let anybody tell you ‘you should.’

BDF: Ok, last burning question: what was your favorite swashbuckling movie?

DB: There are so many good ones that are good for different reasons. In my opinion, the best ones are Ridley Scott’s first movie, The Duellists, The Three Musketeers, Queen Margot, and the original Arnold Schwarzenegger version of Conan the Barbarian. It’s a classic.

I think that group of four movies if you saw no other swordfight movie, you could get by with watching those. You’d have one that’s pure fantasy but still has a lot of really great fight scenes in it, and you’d see three that probably have some of the most realistic fight scenes. And it’s all because of the intent. When you watch the fight scenes from The Duelist, you will think those guys are trying to kill each other!

BDF: I’ve seen Conan, but I’ll have to add the other three to my list. This has been amazing, David, I’ve had such a great time. Thank you for taking the time to sit down with us and chat.

DB: I had a really good time as well. I’m glad to do it. Maybe we can do it again sometime!

What’s next?

To see more of David Baker’s work be sure to follow him at @bakerblades on Instagram or find him on Facebook at David Baker Weaponsmaker. David will also be making an appearance as a judge for the upcoming finale of Last Blade Standing season three (get tickets to the live finale here!). Of course, be sure to tune in to Forged In Fire to watch him in action!